UPDATE: Notre Dame football recruiting: Irish have strength in numbers

SOUTH BEND -- It's not just the numbers, it's the oomph behind them now.

So as Brian Kelly was assembling his fourth recruiting class as Notre Dame's head football coach, in the cycle that ended on Wednesday's National Signing Day, the message had to change.

So did the mind-set of the recruits on the other end of the communications.

The shift to a hard-sell of sorts culminated in a 24-man class that was punctuated by a late and seismic addition, defensive lineman Eddie Vanderdoes, one of four prospects in the Irish group that at some point in the process were in someone else's recruiting class.

The 6-foot-3, 305-pounder from Auburn, Calif., who signed his letter-of-intent at 7:40 p.m. EST on Wednesday and announced shortly thereafter, gives ND four of the nation's 33 five-star prospects in this cycle. At No. 21 on Rivals.com's list of top prospects (and No. 6 at 247Sports), Vanderdoes is ranked higher coming out of high school than ND's 2011 class jewels, defensive linemen Aaron Lynch and Stephon Tuitt.

Vanderdoes ultimately chose the Irish over Alabama and UCLA. His late addition to the ND class boosted the Irish from fifth to third in 247Sports' final class rankings and fourth to third in Rivals.com's final pecking order.

He and fellow five-star signee safety Max Redfield, were originally committed to USC. Another five-star guy, running back Greg Bryant, was extracted from Oklahoma's fold.

All three of them, and the nation's No. 3 overall prospect -- linebacker Jaylon Smith from Fort Wayne, Ind. -- will have to exercise some degree of patience, though. No one in this class has a clear path to a starting berth for ND's 2013 opener with Temple on Aug. 31.

Those with the best opportunity/talent combination to get on the field early, though, are Smith, Vanderdoes and Redfield on defense; Bryant and fellow running back Tarean Folston on offense.

"Greg is a physical, inside runner," Kelly said of the 5-11. 200-pounder. "He can run between the tackles. We needed a little bit of that with Theo (Riddick graduating). He can bring that.

"Tarean (5-10, 195) is a very gifted player in all facets. (He can play) wide receiver. He's played defensive back. He's a guy that I think is a very valuable piece to the offensive structure for us, because he can play that slot receiver as the running back, and then Greg can give you that physical running. So I think both of those guys have a chance to compete right away."

A chance, not a certainty.

Kelly's 2010 recruiting mantras of "we've got holes to fill" and "you can get us back to the BCS stage" are well past their expiration dates.

This cycle was all about building depth. It's not the most alluring message you can drop on a prospect and his family in a living room chat, but it's what elite programs do.

And apparently what elite prospects are willing to listen to.

"They're not elite players if they're afraid of competition," Kelly said Wednesday during his signing day-apalooza press conference. "Those that back off and say, 'Well, you've got two of these guys and you've got three of those now, sometimes that makes a difference, granted. I understand that.

"But, by and large, we've made the case in recruiting where we see you, and we're honest with them. 'Here's where we see you're at, and this is where you're going to be, and if you do this, you're going to get your playing time.' So I think from our end, the elite players have that confidence that no matter who's in front of me, I'm going to beat them out."

Perhaps no one in the class personifies that thought process better than quarterback Malik Zaire, one of five members in the class who enrolled early, in January, and will be able to participate in spring practice.

The 6-11/2, 190-pound lefty from Kettering, Ohio, will start the spring as ND's No. 5 option at QB, with only former starter Tommy Rees on a trajectory to exhaust his eligibility in 2013 among the four players in front of Zaire.

"What I loved about Malik is when he came up here last spring (on a recruiting visit), he sat in our quarterback meeting room," Kelly said. "And in that meeting room you've got some really good quarterbacks.

"When he left that meeting, he made it clear to me that this was the place he wanted to be. He loved the environment. He loved the coaching. He loved the opportunity to come in and run the offense.

"And that's looking at great competition and saying, 'I don't care about that. I'm going to come to Notre Dame, because it's the right place for me academically, and it's the right place for me, because I'm going to be the starter here at Notre Dame.' And we love those kind of guys that have that attitude."

More then talent

Jaylon Smith is expected to make an impact somewhere, sometime on the field next season. He already did plenty of that off the field over the past several months.

"He really was part of putting this class together early on," Kelly said. "As you remember, we had 19 commitments before we played in our first game, in large part to Jaylon Smith's networking and talking to other recruits. So it's pretty clear that he has that dynamic personality that people want to be around."

On second thought

In the moments that followed Notre Dame's 42-14 loss to Alabama in the BCS National Championship Game on Jan. 7, Kelly acknowledged the gap between the programs that finished No. 1 and No. 4 in the final AP poll as significant.

Wednesday, he revised the enormity of it.

"I want to backtrack off of that statement a little bit," he said Wednesday. "After the game I felt that way, but after I got a chance to watch more film and look at it in a little more detail, there are a couple of players we had a hard time with and some things that we can do better from a coaching standpoint.

"We're close. We've got to obviously continue to develop our players, but it's not as far as I thought after the game."

Elliott's special day

Signing day was special for Notre Dame safeties coach Bob Elliott, but not for the reasons you might think.

It was Wednesday that Elliott received a kidney that will extend his life after suffering for roughly a year with kidney failure, as first reported by Sports Illustrated's Pete Thamel.

The kidney donor is Elliott's sister, Betsy Stough.

"He's been incredible," Kelly said of Elliott. "He's taking care of his health needs that go back from battling cancer years ago, and it caught up to him. So this is just a great opportunity for him to get back to full health and back out on the football field. And we're expecting a speedy recovery."

Personnel matters

-- Kelly had expected safety Jamoris Slaughter's appeal for sixth year of eligibility to have been resolved by signing day, but ND continues to play the waiting game. Slaughter's 2012 season was cut short by an Achilles heel injury he suffered Sept. 15 against Michigan State. He sat out as a freshman, in 2008.

-- Junior offensive tackle Tate Nichols conversion to a medical hardship appears to be close to being made official. Chronic injuries, including one that required offseason knee surgery, have limited Nichols to one cameo -- against Miami this season (Oct. 6) -- during his collegiate career.

Squibs

-- The three players who were once in ND's recruiting class but ended up elsewhere are linebackers Alex Anzalone (Florida) and Danny Mattingly (Oregon), and running back Jamel James (Texas State).

-- Former Notre Dame head coach Charlie Weis ended up with the nation's No. 44 class at Kansas, tied with Miami (Fla.), per Rivals.com. Bob Davie, another former Irish coach, checked in at No. 98 with his second class at New Mexico.